Monica Lewinsky is speaking out in defense of Barron Trump after President Trump’s 10-year-old son has been the target of some harsh words online.
“All children need to be protected from bullying + mockery. (incl #barrontrump),” Lewisnky wrote on Twitter. “Let’s be better than this.”
The former White House intern who was at the center of the sex scandal involving President Bill Clinton has become a staunch anti-bullying advocate in recent years. She has previously referred to herself as one of the first victims of cyber-bullying.
“Overnight, I went from being a completely private figure to a publicly humiliated one worldwide,” she said in April. “Granted, it was before social media, but people could still comment online, email stories, and, of course, email cruel jokes.”
Lewinsky is the latest public figure to come to the aid of the President’s youngest child, with former first daughter Chelsea Clinton telling people to leave him alone as well.
“Barron Trump deserves the chance every child does — to be a kid,” Clinton. “Standing up for every kid also means opposing POTUS policies that hurt kids.”
The issue of attacking Barron came to a head during the inauguration on Friday, when an “SNL” writer tweeted that he could become America’s first “homeschool shooter.” The writer has since been suspended from the show indefinitely.
Last year, Rosie O’Donnell came under fire when she retweeted a video suggesting that Barron was autistic. She later apologized to his mother ,Melania Trump, writing, “I was insensitive in my RT – i am sorry for the pain i caused – it was not my intent – i am truly sorry (sic).”
The video itself sparked the threat of a lawsuit from Melania. The following day, the man who posted the video to YouTube, James Hunter, pulled the video from YouTube and issued an apology, calling the video “false, defamatory and malicious.”
“In the video, I suggested Barron Trump might suffer from autism. That is in fact 100 percent false,” Hunter said. “It was incredibly irresponsible of me to diagnose Barron Trump using a selection of misleading videos.”